"The term 'humanities' includes, but is not limited to, the study and interpretation of the following: language, both modern and classical; linguistics; literature; history; jurisprudence; philosophy; archaeology; comparative religion; ethics; the history, criticism and theory of the arts; those aspects of social sciences which have humanistic content and employ humanistic methods; and the study and application of the humanities to the human environment with particular attention to reflecting our diverse heritage, traditions, and history and to the relevance of the humanities to the current conditions of national life." --National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act, 1965, as amended.[3]

The Division of Research Programs for the National Endowment for the Humanities encourages research and writing in all areas of the humanities, including the study of history, literature, philosophy, religion, and foreign cultures. Through grants to individual scholars and institutions, the division fosters work that enables Americans to understand the world.

"The human condition encompasses the unique and believed to be inescapable features of being human."[4]

"It can be described as the irreducible part of humanity that is inherent and not dependent on factors such as gender, race or class. It includes concerns such as the meaning of life, the search for gratification, the sense of curiosity, the inevitability of isolation, or anxiety regarding the inescapability of death."[4]

The humanities are a set of disciplines and fields that "help us to understand the nature of the human condition and the broader cultural and social arrangements that make up human lives."[4]

"Humanism is a group of philosophies and ethical perspectives which emphasize the value and agency of human beings, individually and collectively, and generally prefers individual thought and evidence (rationalism, empiricism), over established doctrine or faith (fideism). The term humanism can be ambiguously diverse, and there has been a persistent confusion between several related uses of the term because different intellectual movements have identified with it over time.[5] [An account of the evolution of the meaning of the word humanism from the point of view of a modern secular humanist can be found in Nicolas Walter's Humanism – What's in the Word[5]. From the same perspective, but somewhat less polemical, can be found in Richard Norman's On Humanism (Thinking in Action)[6]. For a historical and philologically oriented view, see Vito Giustiniani, "Homo, Humanus, and the Meanings of Humanism" (1985)]. In philosophy and social science, humanism refers to a perspective that affirms some notion of a "human nature" (contrasted with anti-humanism). In modern times, many humanist movements have become strongly aligned with secularism, with the term Humanism often used as a byword for non-theistic beliefs about ideas such as meaning and purpose."[7]

"Assisting participants to take responsibility for their own lives and choices (Perls et al., 1951), to deepen authenticity (Bugental, 1989; Yalom, 1980), and to increase interpersonal awareness through dialogical therapy (Friedman, 1985) are all humanistic methods."[8]

"The emergence of humanistic methods in the seventies reflected another dimension to a focus on the learner. Humanistic methods were those in which the following principles were considered important:

the development of human values

growth in self-awareness and the understanding of others

sensitivity to human feelings and emotions

active student involvement in learning and the way learning takes place."[9]

"[O]ver the last 30 years [1970s to 2000s] ... [each issue has changed to] what current beliefs and practices ... are. In the process we will also see hints of the transition from modernism (the rejection of prescription, authority, untested claims and assertions in favor [of] reason, empirical investigation and objectivity closely associated with the scientific method) to postmodernism (the rejection of modernism for failing to recognize the cultural relativity of all forms of knowledge, an emphasis on the autonomous individual, and the adoption of amoral stance against all forms of injustice)."[9]

Def. "[t]he holistic scientific and social study of humanity, mainly using ethnography as its method"[10] is called anthropology.

"Anthropology is distinguished from other social science disciplines by its emphasis on in-depth examination of context, cross-cultural comparisons, and the importance it places on long-term, experiential immersion in the area of research."[10]

The Dominant SEVEN consists of seven graduate and postgraduate musicians from the Australian National University School of Music in Canberra. Credit: Peter Ellis.

Def. "[t]he conscious production or arrangement of sounds, colours, forms, movements, or other elements in a manner that affects the sense of beauty, specifically the production of the beautiful in a graphic or plastic medium"[12] is called an art.

"The arts are a vast subdivision of culture, composed of many endeavors (or artforms) united by their employment of the human creative impulse. The term implies a broader range of disciplines than "art", which in modern usage usually refers only to the visual arts.[13] The other major constituents of the arts are the literary arts, more often called literature – including poetry, novels and short stories, among others – and the performing arts, among them music, dance, magic, theatre, opera and film.[14] Literary arts and creative writing are actually interchangeable terms.[15] These divisions are by no means absolute as there are artforms which combine a visual element with performance (e.g. film) and the written word (e.g. comics). This list is by no means comprehensive, but only meant to introduce the concept of the arts."[16]

"The classics ... refer to [studies of the] cultures of classical antiquity"[17], namely the cultures of the 8th-7th centuries BC (2800-2700 b2k) ending "with the dissolution of classical culture at the close of Late Antiquity [between] AD 300-600 [1700-1400 b2k]."[18]

"The study of the classics is considered one of the cornerstones of the humanities"[17]

"During [classical antiquity], the concept of the seven liberal arts evolved, involving grammar, rhetoric and logic (the trivium), along with arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music (the quadrivium).[19] These subjects formed the bulk of medieval education, with the emphasis being on the humanities as skills or "ways of doing.""[17]

"Though we generally use the words "classical" and "Classics" in a high-cultural sense, this use is derivative and figuratively loaded. These words derive from the Latin adjective classicus,-a,-um, originally referring to someone belonging to the highest of the five classes of Roman citizens in the division of the Roman people according to property and wealth made by Servius Tullius (Livy 1.43.5; Aulus Gellius 6[7].13.1, 3)."[20]

This photo of the Al Jazeera English Newsdesk is in the Doha headquarters. Credit: Wittylama.

"Communication is the activity of conveying information. ... Communication requires a sender, a message, and an intended recipient, although the receiver need not be present or aware of the sender's intent to communicate at the time of communication; thus communication can occur across vast distances in time and space. Communication requires that the communicating parties share an area of communicative commonality. The communication process is complete once the receiver has understood the message of the sender. Feedback is critical to effective communication between parties."[21]

Def. "[t]he concept or state of exchanging information between entities"[22] is called communication.

Def. "[t]he study of principles relating to right and wrong conduct [or] [t]he standards that govern the conduct of a person, especially a member of a profession"[25] is called ethics.

"Although the terms ethics and morality may sometimes be used interchangeably, philosophical ethicists often distinguish them, using ethics to refer to theories and conceptual studies relating to good and evil and right and wrong, and using morality and its related terms to refer to actual, real-world beliefs and practices concerning proper conduct. In this vein, the American philosopher Brand Blanshard wrote concerning his friend, the eminent British ethicist [George Edward Moore] G. E. Moore: "We often discussed ethics, but seldom morals. . . . He was a master in ethical theory, but did not conceive himself as specially qualified to pass opinions on politics or social issues." [26]"[25]

"In particular, in general usage ethical is used to describe standards of behavior between individuals, while moral or immoral can describe any behavior. You can call lying unethical or immoral, for example, because it involves the behavior of one person and how it affects another, but violating dietary prohibitions in a holy text would be described as immoral."[25]

"History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. ... It is a field of research which uses a narrative to examine and analyse the sequence of events, and it sometimes attempts to investigate objectively the patterns of cause and effect that determine events.[27][28]"[29]

The conditions in the jails in Pakistan are deplorable; most of the prisons are more than 100 years old. Credit: Anees Jillani.

"Law[33] is a system of rules and guidelines which are enforced through social institutions to govern behavior, wherever possible.[34] It shapes politics, economics and society in numerous ways and serves as a social mediator of relations between people."[35]

“Linguistics is the scientific study of human language.[36][37][38][39] Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context.”[40]

“Although linguistics is the scientific study of language, a number of other intellectual disciplines are relevant to language and intersect with it. Semiotics, for example, is the general study of signs and symbols both within language and without. Literary theorists study the use of language in literature. Linguistics additionally draws on and informs work from such diverse fields as acoustics, anthropology, biology, computer science, human anatomy, informatics, neuroscience, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and speech-language pathology.”[40]

York road library has been closed for over 20 years and is designed in an adaptation of the Renaissance style to express the purpose for which the building will be used (first dominant form of English Renaissance was Literature). Credit: philld.

Literature "is the art of written work, and can, in some circumstances, refer exclusively to published sources."[42]

"Literature may consist of texts based on factual information (journalistic or non-fiction), as well as on original imagination, such as polemical works as well as autobiography, and reflective essays as well as belles-lettres. Literature can be classified according to historical periods, genres, and political influences. The concept of genre, which earlier was limited, has broadened over the centuries. A genre consists of artistic works which fall within a certain central theme, and examples of genre include romance, mystery, crime, fantasy, erotica, and adventure, among others."[42] Two others are science fiction and horror.

This image shows an academic gown as worn by someone of the degree of doctor of philosophy. The design follows that set forth by the Intercollegiate Code of Academic Costume which is the dominant style used in the United States. Credit: Gardner Cotrell Leonard.

"Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language.[43][44] Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational argument.[45]"[46]

"Philosophy is a study of problems which are ultimate, abstract and very general. These problems are concerned with the nature of existence, knowledge, morality, reason and human purpose."[43]

"The aim of philosophical inquiry is to gain insight into questions about knowledge, truth, reason, reality, meaning, mind, and value."[44]

"Philosophy is rationally critical thinking, of a more or less systematic kind about the general nature of the world (metaphysics or theory of existence), the justification of belief (epistemology or theory of knowledge), and the conduct of life (ethics or theory of value). Each of the three elements in this list has a non-philosophical counterpart, from which it is distinguished by its explicitly rational and critical way of proceeding and by its systematic nature. Everyone has some general conception of the nature of the world in which they live and of their place in it. Metaphysics replaces the unargued assumptions embodied in such a conception with a rational and organized body of beliefs about the world as a whole. Everyone has occasion to doubt and question beliefs, their own or those of others, with more or less success and without any theory of what they are doing. Epistemology seeks by argument to make explicit the rules of correct belief formation. Everyone governs their conduct by directing it to desired or valued ends. Ethics, or moral philosophy, in its most inclusive sense, seeks to articulate, in rationally systematic form, the rules or principles involved."[45]

Def.

"[t]he love of wisdom",

"[a]n academic discipline that seeks truth through reasoning rather than empiricism",

The Tarantula Nebula is the dominant feature in our satellite galaxy the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). It is one of the largest known star formation regions anywhere. Credit: 2MASS/T. Jarrett, R. Hurt, NASA.

"Region is most commonly found as a term used in terrestrial and astrophysics sciences also an area, notably among the different sub-disciplines of geography, studied by regional geographers. Regions consist of subregions that contain clusters of like areas that are distinctive by their uniformity of description based on a range of statistical data, for example demographic, and locales. In astrophysics some regions have science-specific terms such as galactic clusters."[49]

"In Geography, regions can be broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of Humanity and the environment (environmental geography). Geographic regions and subregions are mostly described by their imprecisely defined, and sometimes transitory boundaries, except in human geography where jurisdiction areas such as national borders are clearly defined in law."[49]

"Apart from the global continental regions, there are also hydrospheric and atmospheric regions that cover the oceans, and discrete climates above the land and water masses of the planet. The land and water global regions are divided into subregions geographically bounded by large geological features that influence large-scale ecologies, such as plains and steppes, forested massifs, deserts, or mountainous regions. Subregions describe the areas within regions that are easily distinguished in both the geological and ecological observable features."[49]

"A region has its own nature that could not be moved. The first nature is its natural environment (landform, climate, etc.). The second nature is its physical elements complex that were built by people in the past. The third nature is its socio-cultural context that could not be replaced by new immigrants."[49]

Def. "[a]ny considerable and connected part of a space or surface; specifically, a tract of land or sea of considerable but indefinite extent; a country; a district; in a broad sense, a place without special reference to location or extent but viewed as an entity for geographical, social or cultural reasons"[50] is called a region.

Def. "a subset of Rn{\displaystyle \mathbb {R} ^{n}} that is open (in the standard Euclidean topology), connected and non-empty"[51] is called a region, or region of Rn{\displaystyle \mathbb {R} ^{n}}, where Rn{\displaystyle \mathbb {R} ^{n}} is the n-dimensional real number system.

Theorem any connected, non-empty topology that maps to, or can be mapped to, a subset of Rn{\displaystyle \mathbb {R} ^{n}} is also a region, or region of Rn{\displaystyle \mathbb {R} ^{n}}.

The major denominations and religions of the world are occasionally characterized with the term dominant group. In the Notes for the map at right is "Regions within a state whose predominant religion is different from the plurality religion of the nation-state are not separately indicated" [bold added], uses predominant religion, which is a relative synonym for dominant group.

Def. "[a] collection of practices, based on beliefs and teachings that are highly valued or sacred"[52], religion number 1, is called a religion.

Def. "[a]ny ongoing spiritual practice one engages in, in order to shape their character or improve traits of their personality"[52] number 3, is called a religion.

Def. "[a]n ideological and traditional heritage"[52] number 4, is called a religion.

Usage notes

same as above

"Generally speaking, certain groups that do not acknowledge the existence of one or more deities, such as Buddhism, are still religious, though some people prefer a definition of religion that discourages non-theistic groups from identifying as religious. Others are in favor of a more inclusive definition of religion that recognizes that everyone has their own set of religious beliefs. Avoid calling religious institutions that should be called churches, religions."[52]

"Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values.[53] Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to explain the origin of life or the universe. They tend to derive morality, ethics, religious laws or a preferred lifestyle from their ideas about the cosmos and human nature."[54]

"Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.[55]"[56]

Def. "reasoning or discussion concerning the Deity"[57], is called theologia.[56]

"God is often referred to by masculine pronouns, not necessarily implying that the speaker believes that God is male. He is also referred to by pronouns that begin with a capital letter, as a sign of respect, in many languages written in Latin script. In English, these would include He, Him, His and Himself. Many Jews follow a prohibition in their tradition against using it and other equivalents in writing (see G-d)."[60]

↑Robertson, Crimes against humanity, 90; see "analytical jurisprudence" for extensive debate on what law is; in The Concept of Law Hart argued law is a "system of rules" (Campbell, The Contribution of Legal Studies, 184); Austin said law was "the command of a sovereign, backed by the threat of a sanction" (Bix, John Austin); Dworkin describes law as an "interpretive concept" to achieve justice (Dworkin, Law's Empire, 410); and Raz argues law is an "authority" to mediate people's interests (Raz, The Authority of Law, 3–36).

↑While religion is difficult to define, one standard model of religion, used in religious studies courses, was proposed by Clifford Geertz, who simply called it a "cultural system" (Clifford Geertz, Religion as a Cultural System, 1973). A critique of Geertz's model by Talal Asad categorized religion as "an anthropological category." (Talal Asad, The Construction of Religion as an Anthropological Category, 1982.)